Abstract

Cubic metastable multilayers were grown by reactive arc evaporation using and Ti cathodes in a atmosphere. X-ray diffractometry and high resolution transmission electron microscopy revealed that metastable partly decomposes after annealing at into rich and rich phases with retained lattice coherency. Elemental mapping by energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy showed a homogenous distribution of Ti and Al in the as-deposited 25 nm layers. The annealed layers exhibited coherent 5 nm domains with high Al content surrounded by a high Ti content matrix. This nanostructure formation is discussed in terms of spinodal decomposition.